Macworld
The M4 MacBook Pro, iMac and Mac mini launched in October 2024 but the M4 MacBook Air was a no show. Apple’s now fixed that with the launch of an M4 MacBook Air.
M4 MacBook Air: Release date
- Pre-order the M4 MacBook Air from Thursday, March 5
- On sale from Wednesday, March 12
On March 3 Tim Cook tweeted a message that “this week” something is “in the Air”, suggesting a new product will launch soon, and indeed it did. Two days later the M4 MacBook Air was announced.
Alongside the MacBook Air the Mac Studio also got an update. The day before Apple update the iPad and iPad Air, we have more on those models in separate articles.
M4 MacBook Air price: How much does the new MacBook Air cost?
- 13-inch MacBook Air starts at $999/£999
- 15-inch MacBook Air starts at $1,199/£1,199
Good news: Apple has effectively brought down the price of buying an M4 MacBook Air. For a number of years Apple has kept the price of entry lower by continuing to sell the previous generation at a lower price.
This time round Apple has replaced the M2 MacBook Air with a M4 model at the same price of $999/£999. So now you can get an M4 MacBook Air for less than $1,000. The M3 MacBook Air started at $1,099/£1,099.
| MacBook Air model | U.S. | U.S. | Canada | Australia |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 13in, 16GB RAM, 256GB SSD | $999 | £999 | $1,399 | $1,699 |
| 13in, 16GB RAM, 512GB SSD | $1,199 | £1,199 | $1,699 | $1,999 |
| 13in, 24GB RAM, 512GB SSD | $1,399 | £1,399 | $1,999 | $2,299 |
| 15in, 16GB RAM, 256GB SSD | $1,199 | £1,199 | $1,699 | $2,099 |
| 15in, 16GB RAM, 512GB SSD | $1,399 | £1,399 | $1,999 | $2,399 |
| 15in, 24GB RAM, 512GB SSD | $1,599 | £1,599 | $2,299 | $2,699 |
M4 MacBook Air: Processor
Apple surprised us with the release of the M4 chip in the iPad Pro in early May, barely six months after the M3 debuted in the MacBook Pro. Then in October 2024, Apple released the M4 MacBook Pro, iMac, and Mac mini. Now five months later the M4 has made it’s way into the MacBook Air.
The specs are similar to those in the M4 MacBook Pro, iMac & Mac mini, with the main difference being that the entry-level MacBook Air features a 8-core GPU.
MacBook Air M4
- 10-core CPU (4 performance cores and 6 efficiency cores)
- 8-core GPU or 10-core GPU
- Hardware-accelerated ray tracing
- 16-core Neural Engine
- 120GBps memory bandwidth
- 16GB or 24GB RAM, support for 32GB RAM
MacBook Pro, iMac & Mac mini M4
- 10-core CPU (4 performance cores and 6 efficiency cores)
- 10-core GPU
- Hardware-accelerated ray tracing
- 16-core Neural Engine
- 120GBps memory bandwidth
- 16GB or 24GB RAM, support for 32GB RAM
Compared to the 8-core M3, the M4 has two extra efficiency cores and higher memory bandwidth (120GBps versus 100GBps). Apple will likely use the same design for the Mac.
Will Apple continue to sell a cut-price M3 MacBook Air?
The M3 MacBook Air is not being sold as the entry-level model. It’s been Apple’s habit in recent years to keep the previous generation model on sale to offer a lower price of entry to the range.
Apple’s decision may have been influenced by problems with the manufacturer of the M3 chip. Reports suggest partner TSMC had found that it was costly to produce and yields were lower than those of previous processes. The M4 chip uses a more efficient 3nm fabrication process. This goes some way to explain why Apple jumped from M2 to M4 for the iPad Pro and completely bypassed the M3 for the Mac mini, Mac Studio and Mac Pro. See: Apple’s M3 nightmare is coming to an end.
The M3, on the other hand, is being used in the iPad Air.
M4 MacBook Air: Design
Apple
The biggest news is possibly the introduction of a new color for the MacBook Air!
Apple has introduced a new Sky Blue shade to the line up. The metalic blye shade comes with a blue MagSafe cable. Sky Blue joins Silver, Midnight and Starlight as the color options.
Otherwise the design of the MacBook Air hasn’t changed since Apple introduced it with the M2 chip upgrade in July 2022.
M4 MacBook Air: Specs
The MacBook Air was guaranteed to get an M4 chip and it has. This chip is already well known, featuring first in the iPad Pro, then the MacBook Pro, iMac and Mac mini.
Based on leaked GPU results prior to the launch it appears that the new MacBook Air will offer GPU performance similar to that of the M4 iPad Pro. The Geekbench results show a Metal score of 55516 and another score of 54806. The M4 iPad Pro scored 54231. In our tests, the M4 MacBook Pro’s GPU Metal score was 57082. We’ll be reviewing the new model soon.
The lower result compared to the MacBook Pro is likely to be a result of necessary throttling to allow the machine, which lacks a fan, to stay cool. The M4 in the MacBook Air may also have fewer GPU cores than the MacBook Pro.
When Apple released the M4 MacBook Pro in October 2024, the company increased the base amount of RAM to 16GB. It also did the same with the M2 and M3 MacBook Air that is currently for sale. Apple will no longer release a laptop that starts with 8GB of RAM. New with the M4 MacBook Air is support for 32GB RAM.
Battery life is still at 18 hours, like the MacBook Air M3.
As expected the camera on the front of the MacBook Air has been upgraded from a 1080p FaceTime HD camera to a 12MP Center Stage camera with support for Desk View.
Everything else about the MacBook Air has stayed the same. The display, size, weight, mics, speakers, ports, Wi-Fi, and Bluetooth are unchanged.
The M3 MacBook Air prices
Here are the prices for the configurations of the M3 MacBook Air for reference.
13-inch MacBook Air
- $1,099/£1,099: M3 with 8-core CPU, 8-core GPU; 16GB unified memory; 256GB SSD
- $1,299/£1,299: M3 with 8-core CPU, 10-core GPU; 16GB unified memory; 512GB SSD
- $1,499/£1,499: M3 with 8-core CPU, 10-core GPU; 16GB unified memory; 512GB SSD
15-inch MacBook Pro
- $1,299/£1,299: M3 with 8-core CPU, 10-core GPU; 16GB unified memory; 256GB SSD
- $1,499/£1,499: M3 with 8-core CPU, 10-core GPU; 16GB unified memory; 512GB SSD
- $1,699/£1,699: M3 with 8-core CPU, 10-core GPU; 16GB unified memory; 512GB SSD
Source : Macworld
